Senior Defense Official: I'll make a few
comments about this morning's activities and, I think, where
the meetings are going. This is really the first meeting --
formal meeting -- of the North Atlantic Council defense
ministers since September 11th. And it's the first time
that Secretary Rumsfeld has been back to NATO since
September 11th. I think the focus, not only for Secretary
Rumsfeld but also clearly for all the ministers here, is the
subject of terrorism and the campaign against terrorism.

A number of themes, I think, are emerging from the morning
meeting. One is tremendous NATO support for the United
States and for its approach to the war, particularly in
Afghanistan. And I think ministers are beginning to look
ahead, but there was consensus around the table that things
are not finished in Afghanistan. There's a lot to do. In
particular, the need to get al Qaeda, the al Qaeda
leadership, was a main point that came out of the morning
meetings.

In addition to looking ahead, sort of
from the standpoint of the war, NATO is collectively
beginning to look ahead at how does NATO fashion
capabilities to deal with the terrorist threat in the
future. NATO realizes that it has to adapt itself to deal
with these new threats. And in addition, a more general
point that NATO needs to invest more resources into defense,
so that we're not caught, in effect, having to ramp up
spending when a conflict like this unexpectedly occurs.

Finally, a final point would be simply, I think there was
quite a bit of discussion about the idea of asymmetric
threats. That while there still exist traditional military
threats that NATO forces might have to deal with -- and
indeed NATO needs to overcome shortcomings in certain things
like mobility, for example -- dealing with asymmetric
threats, cyberwarfare, obviously the terrorist threat,
cruise missiles, weapons of mass destruction, those kinds of
things -- ballistic missiles - are areas that NATO needs to
put more emphasis on. So I think ministers had a really full
discussion, a very energetic discussion, in several
sessions, and I'm looking forward to the afternoon
meetings.

Q: Was there any push, or discussion,
or suggestion for developing coordinated cells within the
alliance to, say, work together on cyberterrorism, work
together on protecting -- instead of everyone shooting off
in different directions? You know, with different kinds of
technology? Is there going to be some concerted effort to
do this? In these different areas?

Senior Defense
Official: I see what you're saying, yeah. I mean, I think
that what will come out of this meeting is that NATO
authorities here will develop some plans and some taskings
on just those problems, and that NATO will be looking at
these, not only in the runup to the next meeting in June,
but also in the runup to the Prague meeting in late fall. I
think it's in November. Obviously, and I should say,
clearly there was a lot of discussion and I expect there
will be more discussion about enlargement this afternoon.
So enlargement is still -- looms large on the minds of --
(chuckles)

Unknown voice: Boo.

Senior
Defense Official: Sorry. Well, you know -- on the minds of
ministers. But I think that, yeah, there will be some
taskings and things that will come out of this session.

Q: If I could jump ahead to the afternoon session, because
I don't think we're going to be seeing you between now and
then -- a discussion, a debate, a proposal to reduce forces
in Bosnia by 6,000. Is there really a sense that that is
such a drain on the American military that it prevents us
from thoroughly carrying out the war on terror?

Senior Defense Official: I don't think that we should look
at it as a drain on the American military. By the way, the
proposal is not to reduce American forces --

Unknown voice: (inaudible)

Senior Defense
Official: Yeah, I just want to be clear for those who may
not be as clear, the proposal, as the president said, "In
together; out together." So our proposal is, in effect, to
have a reduction in overall presence by 6,000. Keeping --
yeah, a proportional reduction.

And I think
perhaps a better way to think about this is that if NATO is
going to be able to respond to crises in the future, and if
NATO publics are going to provide support to their
governments to respond to crises in the future, we're going
to have to demonstrate that we have a way of ending, in
effect, our interventions. In ending, there has to be a way
that -- otherwise publics will lose confidence if every time
you get involved in something if you're stuck there for sort
of an unlimited period of time. You'll end up with a
situation where publics are not going to support the use of
force.

So, in effect, this is not a, sort of, in
opposition. We've done great work in Bosnia. I think our
view is that SFOR is a resounding success. We're certainly
not calling for a complete withdrawal of force from there,
but we do believe missions need to be modified and, in some
cases, scaled back. In some cases focused in other areas.
For example, terrorism. There was discussion today of about
dealing with potential terrorist activities in the Balkans.
So I think the idea is not so much to focus on the number --
although we think about a 6,000 decrease is justified by, in
effect the success, the improvements on the ground there.

I don't know if that puts it in context.

Q: A
follow-up point. How does that 6,000 break down between
U.S. forces and other countries?

Senior Defense
Official: Oh boy. I think, I'm not exactly sure. I can
get you that number. If you're looking for a number, I can
get you a rough number. But again, I don't know that -- it
would be a rough number because it wouldn't necessarily --
this is something we are proposing to the alliance. It's
something that ministers will --

Q: Does this
come at a time when you do the normal force reviews?

Senior Defense Official: Yeah we're going to this through
the normal process. The aim is to sort of task the national
military authorities to look at this as one of a number of
options for restructuring our forces in the Balkans broadly
and in Bosnia. So no, this is not being done outside the
normal processes.

Q: Is the discussion of
enlargement being driven in any way by the focus on
terrorism and the need to shift long term planning to
asymmetric threats and terrorism? Is there a linkage
between the two?

Senior Defense Official: Yeah, I
haven't really seen a nexus between the two. I think that
other than perhaps in a sort of -- the broadest sense, which
is that one of the important goals of enlargement -- is to
bring these new democracies into a security system where
they can flourish, where they can feel secure, and in that
way, we are helping to develop societies that are less
susceptible to terrorism. And maybe in that broadest sense.
But I don't think the two issues are closely related.

Q: Are you going to change the DCI, the Defense
Capabilities Initiative, in regards to asymmetric warfare?
Is that going to be something formally presented?

Senior Defense Official: To my knowledge, it's not going to
be formally presented in this session. I think that what
will come out of our meetings will be some initiatives,
perhaps not utilizing the DCI since that's more focused on
other kinds of capabilities. But there will be some
taskings on improving, for example, the alliance's ability
to respond to chemical and biological warfare threats and,
you know, consequence management. Those sorts of issues.

Q: That would be in addition to DCI? Or is this
supplanting it?

Senior Defense Official: No. I
don't think it's supplanting it. The DCI was, by the way,
discussed in a morning session, and one of the things, I
think is -- there is general, broad support for the DCI and,
in particular, I think some members argued strongly for the
need for -- I mean, the commitment to DCI is there. The
commitment of resources is not always there. So there was a
lot of talk about the need to go back and commit resources.
And as you well know, the people sitting around this table
are the defense ministers. And you don't find very many of
them who are not interested in getting additional defense
resources, right? But the problem is having to go back and
work it in capitals. And so, and I know that this issue was
also brought up at the foreign ministers' meeting because,
interestingly, the foreign ministers often are the ones
having to make decisions that commit defense resources. And
they can be surprised when they find out there aren't the
kinds of resources available to do the kinds of things that
they think need to be done.

Q: Were there any
feelings expressed -- oh, sorry.

Senior Defense
Official: I don't know if there was anybody else down the
table --

Q: I just wanted to clarify one thing on
the Bosnian proposal, the Bosnian reduction proposal. Would
that be to make those reductions by 2002 or to have a plan
in place by 2002?

Senior Defense Official: The
plan would be to task NATO military authorities in the
beginning of the year to do the analysis over the spring,
that could then be approved by ministers some time in
probably the June time frame, with the idea that the force
reductions would be taken in the next reduction cycle in the
fall of 2002.

Q: By the end of the year?

Senior Defense Official: Yeah. Certainly by the end of the
year. But again I want to be clear that NATO's going to be
looking at a whole range of options that include not just
force reductions, but restructuring how the forces are laid
out in all three areas -- Macedonia, KFOR and SFOR.

Q: Is there going to be a force reduction in Kosovo as part
of that overall restructuring?

Senior Defense
Official: The particular American initiative that we're
talking about here is not. No. I think that if you
conceive of a sort of approach that might come out of this,
that might be sort of a Balkans-wide restructuring, that may
end up just through the process of rationalization, of
bringing those forces down. So for example, if you could
use force in one area to respond to problems in another, you
may not have to keep forces in both areas.

Q: So
you might do a rapid reaction force in Kosovo as a force
that could be used as a rapid reaction force if there were a
problem --

Senior Defense Official: I don't know
if that's going to be a specific proposal but that's the
idea, yes.

Q: Since 6,000 is one-third of what's
in SFOR, of the total of 18,000, can we expect one-third of
the U.S. 3,100 to be reduced? Are we talking approximately
thousand?

Senior Defense Official: I think
approximately 1,000. I did say I would get a more specific
number and I'll be happy to do that.

Q: So when
you said that the ministers this morning were looking
forward this morning to the future, agreeing that it's not
ending in Afghanistan and looking to the future, what was
being talked about there? What were the issues that were
coming out? The possible concerns?

Senior Defense
Official: I think there is a general recognition that --
and some specific discussion about -- the fact that al Qaeda
is not located just in Afghanistan. Number two, there was a
concern expressed by a number of ministers that one of the
outgrowths of the activity in Afghanistan is that al Qaeda
may try to get out of the country and move into either
neighboring countries or further afield. And then,
obviously, one of the focuses had to be on trying to stop
that. But also recognizing that it may well happen and that
we'll have to deal with it.

Q: Just stipulating
the areas that you'll have to deal with.

Senior
Defense Official: Yeah, right. So that was really the main
focus in terms of the conflict. And then the other aspect
of it was the one I spoke of at length.

Q: What
would happen if that happened? If they were able to
disburse and destabilize other areas. Was there any
consensus on that?

Senior Defense Official: I
don't think there was. I think it was more a concern that
was raised about the fact that we should not -- we should
try to not let it happen, number one. And number two, I
think there was a general view that al Qaeda, the al Qaeda
networks, outside of Afghanistan need to be dealt with. But
there were no specific action plans or anything like that
discussed.

Q: But given the fact that going after
terrorism may now involve going after Iraq, for example,
which would be a much bigger military task than Afghanistan,
was there any sentiment or vocal commitment, military
commitment by these nations to the idea, "If you need a lot
of our troops, you'll get them?" Do you see what I mean?
As opposed to --

Senior Defense Official: I'm
cautious of any sentence that includes the word Iraq.
(laughter) So let's take the word out of that sentence.

Q: Suppose you had a much larger task toward some state
that supports terrorism. Is there sentiment among these
countries to provide the extra forces that would be
needed?

Senior Defense Official: Well, it's really
hard to talk about it and, I said I'm not going to talk
about Iraq and I'm not going to talk about it in general
terms. So how are you going to talk about it?

I
think I saw very strong support in the room for what the
United States is doing. One of the things that many
ministers did was talk about the way that their countries
were supporting the campaign and, in some cases, offering
additional aid as needed. There was very much a sense that
not -- as Secretary Rumsfeld has said before, this is going
to be a -- there are going to be multiple coalitions here.
And I think there was a sense in the room that people that--
there would be other places and other possible uses of
either individual military force from NATO countries or NATO
acting as NATO. But there wasn't a specific commitment one
way or another. The ministers weren't really discussing
that. Those kinds of things tend to be worked at a much
lower level in the alliance.

Q: What you got, very
forward leaning?

Senior Defense Official: Oh,
absolutely. I'm hesitating because I don't want to put
words in somebody's mouth but I really think the support was
so great that if we needed additional capabilities, I'm sure
there would be countries that would provide them.

Q: There was no sentiment in the sense that Afghanistan
should be it? That we shouldn't go beyond Afghanistan?

Senior Defense Official: No.

Q: The secretary's
morning statement to the Nuclear Planning Group talks about
the need to adapt and transform America's strategic forces.
What does that mean?

Senior Defense Official: I
think it -- number one, as we bring down the force over the
next decade, we are going to be reliant on a smaller number
of weapons, a smaller number of types of weapons. And
there's going to have to be some investment in our
infrastructure to support that. That infrastructure
investment is also important because it provides us with the
ability to respond to unexpected threats - changes in the
threat -- that we may not be able to foresee now. And it
also acts I think as a dissuasive component. So one of the
ways that we're thinking about this from a transformational
standpoint is that the infrastructure is actually part of
the dissuasive component of the force, whereas in the past
you tended to think about, "Well, what forces do you bring
to the table today right now."

Well, your forces
that are immediately capable are important. But we're also
thinking that our infrastructure maintaining that
infrastructure is an important part of our dissuasive
capabilities.

Q: This language means a new
generation of warheads or what? I understand the words
you're saying but I don't understand the implication.

Senior Defense Official: No, it doesn't necessarily mean a
new generation of warheads. I think what it means is the
ability to repair, respond, if the United States has to
develop new kinds of capabilities, the infrastructure will
be there to do it. The talent, the physical plant, those
kinds of things.

I think that the top priority is
the talent. One of the absolutely most difficult things to
do when you are drawing down capabilities -- and this is
true with conventional forces, not just true with nuclear
forces -- is maintaining the resident expertise. These are
highly complicated, niche technical areas and unless people
are involved in interesting science, as they say, they tend
to migrate into things where they can be better fulfilled,
better paid, whatever.

But I also want to say that
balancing that, is the need to recognize that in dealing
with asymmetric threats and in dealing with what may be
undeterrables, we have to have a broader panoply of
capabilities. So in addition to our nuclear forces, we
would put -- in terms of strategic capabilities -- we would
include advanced conventional forces. So some investment in
longer range strike capabilities of a conventional nature
and missile defenses. Because we cannot expect, as we did
during the cold war, that deterrence will be as reliable as
we think it was. We weren't that sure it was reliable then,
but we at least understood we had a single enemy, a single
opponent. We spent a lot of energy understanding that
opponent. That opponent is gone. We now have the potential
for multiple different opponents, and ones that we don't
expect.

September 11th really underscored this.
Who would have thought we'd have been in Afghanistan
fighting against the Taliban on September 10th?

Q:
Did anyone voice concern, or opposition to the withdrawal
from the ABM treaty?

Senior Defense Official: No.
No.

Q: Is there anything else that the United
States would like from the NATO alliance to assist it in its
war on terrorism besides the things you mentioned, the force
reduction and the general transformation? Is there anything
else the U.S. is looking for or would this be really it?

Senior Defense Official: The U.S. works with individual
NATO countries and makes requests all the time for force
capabilities and other means of support. Principal among
them is intelligence, things like that. And so, I think
that's kind of an ongoing process, but it's not one that is
really dealt with at the ministerial level. In effect, it's
sort of a natural and automatic thing. If you've been down
to CENTCOM, you know that most of the countries represented
here have liaison officers down at CENTCOM. That's the kind
of hand in glove sort of cooperation that we have with our
--

Q: Is it more on an individual basis than
rather with our NATO allies?

Senior Defense
Official: With our NATO allies. That was the first point.
The second point is I think that NATO -- there's nothing --
the ministers did not discuss specific things that we might
ask of NATO. But I think that there is an ongoing effort to
sort of look at additional ways in which NATO can provide
NATO capabilities, whether they be naval or air defense type
capabilities and that sort of thing. But there's nothing
that came out of the meetings this morning.

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